Energy storage devices, such as lithium ion secondary batteries, have been used as power supplies in mobile apparatuses such as notebook PCs and cellular phones. Further, in recent years, such energy storage devices have been used in a wide variety of fields including power supplies for moving bodies such as electric vehicles. If such energy storage devices are brought into overheated states, due to damage and the like in these energy storage devices caused when energy storage devices are used in unexpected usage forms and usage states, their characteristics are degraded or energy storage devices are not capable of properly being charged and properly discharging electricity.
Therefore, conventionally, there have been proposed techniques for preventing overheating in such energy storage devices (refer to JP-A-2010-3690, for example). According to these techniques, an electrical short-circuit is caused between an electrode and a can for discharging an electric current through the can, thereby preventing the overheating in an energy storage device.